


of things unknown (but longed for still)

by nea_writes



Series: I'm here (just like I used to be) [2]
Category: D.Gray-man
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, Introspection, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-16
Updated: 2017-10-16
Packaged: 2019-01-18 00:21:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,379
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12377109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nea_writes/pseuds/nea_writes
Summary: I'm at war with myself.Link has never been eloquent with words.He can't begin to voice nor name the flutter in his chest, like birds caged tight, when the Fourteenth locks eyes with him.Link knows it's not Allen. Link has tailed Allen for weeks, waiting for this very moment, but when the Fourteenth blinks wide gray eyes and openly begins to cry, something in Link's chest tears. Like plucking feathers one by one, bloody and cruel, Link grieves what he has lost.





	of things unknown (but longed for still)

**Author's Note:**

> SPOILERS FOR DGM | NIGHT 226
> 
> Listen, _listen,_ I know Link wasn't in this chapter, that's what this is all about!! I can't believe he actually ran away instead of meeting Allen! Unbelievable!
> 
> So here goes some more thoughts on Link and his relationship (or lack thereof) with Allen.

Link has never been eloquent with words. 

He can use them in his reports, cold stiff facts without feeling, but he can never find the words to say what he feels. They fail him then, as they do now.

He can't begin to voice nor name the flutter in his chest, like birds caged tight, when the Fourteenth locks eyes with him.

Link knows it's not Allen. 

Link has tailed Allen for weeks, waiting for this very moment, but when the Fourteenth blinks wide gray eyes and openly begins to cry, something in Link's chest tears. Like plucking feathers one by one, bloody and cruel, Link grieves what he has lost.

There is nothing more final than that instant as Link discards his bloody and useless heart, weak thing it is as it beats and mourns that which it cannot have. Link answers first and foremost to his duty — it is the only thing in his life that has never failed him.

Doubt, insidious and terrible, wines its way round Link's vertebrae, creeps up his throat, plagues his every thought. Is this really what he wants to do? It is no longer a question of should he or could he, but rather, would he?

Would he abandon the life he has laid at Leverrier's feet, for the chance at redemption Allen gives him, in glimpses of smiles and laughter? Would he throw away all that he's built, for a boy no older than sixteen, thin and haggard with grief, but still, still, bearing the mantle of the world on his shoulders?

Logic wars inside Link with the stupid fluttering in his chest. No. He won't. He can't.

 _It's too late,_ Link thinks, kneeling for Neah D. Campbell.  _I've done too much,_  he knows, as he guides Allen's hand away from the wound piercing his shoulder. He thought, perhaps, that he might feel resentment sacrificing his very life for the Fourteenth, but instead all he can feel is relief.

The wound clots, skin threads back together, life and vigor returns to Allen's pale pallor and — he's healed.

It's sickening, how easily Link will give himself up, time and again.

With a fist curled tight on the ground, Link voices empty words, carrying Leverrier's orders as he was intended to. Link is the wings upon which Leverrier's goals and wishes rest. He has brought fruition to Leverrier's plans before, and he can do it again. He must. Everything he owns now is in debt to Leverrier. His education, his well-being, even the years he's been allowed to keep living in a wretched world that would have spat him out.

Allen Walker is not worthy of that debt.

It's what Link tells himself again and again, doubt whispering between every breath,  _he is, he is, he is._

Link is at war with himself. The heart he lost has found its place in Allen's breathtaking smile, and Link can't bring himself to demand it back. 

The Fourteenth's words cut too close to home, echoing viciously in Link's mind long after the fact.

_In other words, I have no use for you._

Link is well-aware that what Leverrier plans is mad. All of them in Central are mad, caught up in this enticing mystery surrounding the Fourteenth. What Leverrier thinks is a pawn he can control is more than that. The Fourteenth is wicked and intoxicating, drunk off his own ideals and with a heart colder than Link has ever seen. All that moves it, as far as Link is aware, is the Millennium Earl, and even then Link thinks ambition twists whatever lies there.

Link is used to adversity. He was born and bred for it, trained to withstand the worst and to keep locked in iron and steel whatever torment he may feel. He has withstood torture, inflicted it and received it, and he has delivered death to men without remorse at his master's bidding. Link is no stranger to difficulties, but there is a gleam in the Fourteenth's gaze, a madness Link can recognize. 

There is a stirring in Link's heart, hidden behind cartilage and flesh. He recognizes it without hesitation. 

Link pities Neah. Him, and the child-like war he wages against a brother who no longer remembers him.

Even more pitiful —  _frightening_  — is the sway Neah holds over everyone. Over Leverrier, the men in central, Link, the Noah of Pleasure, and most certainly of all, the Earl.

The leer the Fourteenth levels at the Noah of Pleasure runs Link's blood cold. Superimposed is the last smile Link can vividly remember — Allen, cheeky and sweet, holding out a share of a donut Link knows he only gives because it is Link. Otherwise, Allen would have had no shame in eating it whole himself. The taste, of dough too thick and glaze encrusted with sharp bits of sugar, saccharine, coating his teeth, his tongue, lingers in the words he gives Allen, then.  _Thank you._

He tastes that now, intermingling with  fear, sharply contrasting with the stark horror Link feels as the Fourteenth attempts to wield Allen's Innocence with no regard to the body he infects.

Link knows that forcing Neah to do anything won't help his cause, or Leverrier's, or buy him any favor, but Link would rather travel a rocky path than to allow Allen Walker to Fall from grace simply because Neah is throwing a fit about his name.

Link knows full-well what the Fourteenth's name is, but so long as he cannot call Allen's, he refuses to call Neah's, too. It is the very little he can allow himself.

However, before Link can do anything, or even the Noah, Johnny Gill rouses from the spell Link had put him under.

With none of the hesitation that plagues Link's every thought, Johnny reaches out unbidden to the humanity remaining in Allen, and Allen answers back, slowly, stunned.

The moment Allen flutters to life, Link loses all sense of self.  

_Johnny, you called for me. You called...for me..._

The words stab Link like ice, chilling and freezing him, locking his every movement as he watches Johnny Gill leap with more courage than Link will ever possess after Allen.

He forgets the Noah bound by his feathers, the Noah taunting him from mid-air, even the Order men lingering around. He watches, wide-eyed, breath-caught, that fluttering fierce in his chest, as the Fourteenth finally slips away, leaving behind Allen.

Reason surges through, and with a panic-stricken dash, Link stops short of the ledge, watching as luminous wings bloom from Allen.

 _How foolish,_ Link thinks, struck mute with awe,  _to think Allen could ever fall from grace._

It's there, plain as day, that there is no one more beloved by Innocence than Allen.

Innocence, that had trapped the Thirds as Crows when they failed synchronization attempts. Innocence, that had killed Goushi and Kiredori, and ruined what little bond he had with Tewaku. Innocence, that inspires the envy and the God-born reverence Link has smothered since the day he realized how inadequate he was, no matter how he yearned.

Beside him, the Noah is wide-eyed, shocked by the display put on before them. It's not too much of a surprise, Link thinks, watching with what even he knows is too impassioned a gaze, committing every glimpse, every smile, every wisp of Allen's hair across his cheek to memory — it's not a surprise, because by nature, all Allen wants is to reassure.

Link is still rooted to the spot when the Noah makes his move, descending down stairs of his own design towards the joyful reunion Link cannot be a part of.

Envy, Link realizes, is still there. But, it's not the envy Link has grown used to rejecting.

He hears Johnny's cries and Allen's own tearful laughter, and it hits him then that he's envious of the scientist. 

Link takes a step back, and then another. And another. And another. Until he's off the ledge, on  the roof, until he can't even hear their voices anymore. 

He reminds himself, fiercely, even through all the pain and regret he feels expanding in his chest, curling in the empty spot that now beats in Allen Walker's palms, that he's not worth it. He isn't, can't be, couldn't be, won't be.

No matter how conflicted Link feels.

**Author's Note:**

> nea_chi | twitter (currently @spookyalma for the month of october!)  
> nea-writes | tumblr


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